Of Coolships, Cobwebs, and Cantillon

Cantillon needs no introduction. Even if you’re not yet a convinced imbiber of wild-fermented beers, chances are you’ve at least heard of Cantillon, that legendary Brussels brewery of mythic proportions and mystical imaginings. If lambic and gueuze producers in Flemish Brabant merit pilgrimages, Cantillon is the holy grail.IMG_7968Cantillon’s sterling reputation rests on its charm, and has as much to do with its defense of tradition as it does with what’s in the bottle. Pulley-and-gear-driven mash tuns, shallow cool ships in the attic with louvers to control the airflow and temperature, a hop-aging room smelling of old hay and cheese, cobwebs stretched between the rafters, a barrel fermentation room with its characteristic musty-woody smell, and row upon row of aging racks downstairs: The brewery stands as a testament to how beer was brewed at a time when Paul Cantillon set up shop in the Anderlecht district of Brussels at the turn of the twentieth century.IMG_7904 Unlike many other lambic and gueuze producers that have updated their facilities, the dark, timbered, and cobwebbed Cantillon brewery is like a trip back in time.

In Defense of Tradition

Back when Cantillon started slaking the thirst of Anderlecht’s workers, Brussels was home to over a hundred breweries. Today, only two remain: Bellevue, an InBev entity that caters to mass tastes with its sweetened gueuze-like and kriek-like beers, and Cantillon. As the Cantillon brochure pointedly puts it, nowadays “the world of Lambic is dominated by big business and its centuries-old name has been tarnished by large-scale industrial production.”

Up early, we hit the bikes and headed in the direction of Anderlecht, arriving at Cantillon well before noon. Wary of leaving our bikes on the street, we asked the elderly woman selling tickets in the brewery if we could bring our bikes inside. As it turns out, she’s the last living Cantillon, wife of Jean-Pierre Van Roy, the gent who took up the reins of the brewery in the 1960s. And there she was, working in the family business on a Saturday morning, selling 7-euro tickets for the self-guided tour and tasting to follow.

A brewery dominated by the dictates of big business Cantillon is not. The spiders in the rafters upstairs bear witness to the fact. (More on those spiders later.)

Turning Wheat and Barley into Lambic and Gueuze

Cantillon does things in a manner reminiscent of days when artisans were aided by the labour-saving devices of early industrialism. Cranks and pulleys drive a mash tun that looks like a museum piece, and wood’s the word when it comes to fermentation.IMG_7913

Once the wort has finished its boil, it spends the night cooling in a shallow copper vessel tucked among the rafters of the attic. This vessel, known as a coolship, is designed to expose as much of the wort as possible to the evening breezes regulated by wooden louvers that open out into the cool night. Microorganisms resident in the attic and evening air inoculate the wort during this early stage of the fermentation process. An ambient temperature between 3 and 8 degrees Celsius is crucial; too warm, and undesirable yeast and bacteria gain the upper hand. This is why the brewing season typically lasts from October through April only, although recent global warming trends may eventually spell an even shorter brewing season.IMG_7920Bright and early the next morning the brewers set to work transferring the wort into oak or chestnut barrels, where fermentation can take up to three years. During this time, the microbes that inoculated the wort overnight, together with the organisms that inhabit the barrel, produce the astounding array of aromas characteristic of lambic.

Now it’s just a matter of patience. Here’s where the spiders and cobwebs come in. Insects just can’t seem to resist the fermenting beer and the summer deliveries of fresh fruit that Cantillon uses to make its kriek and other fruit beers. Cantillon uses 150 kg of fruit for every 500 liters of two-year-old lambic, so it’s no wonder that the insects are drawn to the brewery. Rather than risk having insecticides seep into the casks, the brewers leave the job of insect control to the spiders.

A word on the barrels: the type of wood used to make the barrels is not as important for lambic makers as it is for winemakers. Rather, lambic brewers prefer barrels already used by winemakers and, to a lesser extent, Cognac producers.IMG_7933 New barrels impart too much tannin and oak character, while used barrels lend that beguiling suggestion of wine. Over repeated use, each barrel develops a character unto itself as the diverse microflora take up residence.

Patience Rewarded

After the lambic reaches a certain point in the fermentation and maturation process, it’s ready to drink straight from the barrel. More often than not, though, the lambics are blended to make gueuze. Gueuze is made from a blend of one-, two-, and three-year-old lambics originating, in Cantillon’s case, from as many as eight barrels. The oldest portion of the blend provides the character, and the youngest portion of the blend initiates a secondary fermentation in the bottle. The result: a dry and tart ale with a dense and frothy foam cap.

Lambics and gueuzes are sometimes described as vinous or cidery, and have a distinctive sour quality. Aromas and flavours range from fruity (citrus, green apples, tart cherry) to phenolic-spicy, from earthy and leathery to oaky with hints of vanilla. And then there’s all that funk: horse blanket, barnyard, cheese, hay.

Not your father’s BudMillerCoors.

***

Now that we’ve spent the past half hour or so wandering through the brewery on our self-guided tour, it’s time to put those tasting tokens to work.

The lambic exhibits a solidly tannic note from the wood, some fresh meadow scent, and a slight tartness. As for the gueuze? Scents of tropical fruit, aged hops with a distinctive cheese quality, pungent flowers, barnyard, ghee, and green apple. On the palate it was creamy, tannic, and with a pleasant lemon-funk rounded out by green apple and a touch of slate-like minerality.

*Of note: The Cantillon lambics and gueuzes that I tasted at the brewery and elsewhere in the Brussels region in May 2016 had an interesting cheese-like pungency on the nose when young –– not overpowering, but clearly present. Later, in June 2016, I tasted a gueuze that was bottled in June 2014. The aged version had developed plenty of additional complexity, and the “cheese” character had aged out into hay, horse/horse blanket, pineapple brett, and gooseberry.IMG_7944

Rosé de Gambrinus is made in the same way as kriek, but with raspberries instead of cherries. Thanks to the skills of the good brewers of Cantillon, the raspberry shines through bright and fresh, as if it has just been picked. The star of the show, though, was a bottle of Foufoune (apricot gueuze-lambic). The subtle yet intense apricot aromas and flavours were exquisite.

Alas, much as we would have liked to taste our way through all of Cantillon’s intriguing offerings, we had made previous arrangements to take a bicycle tour of Brussels. Needless to say, it’s just a matter of time before I head back to Cantillon.

If you’ve had a chance to try the Vigneronne, the Cuvée Saint-Gilloise, the Saint-Lamvinus, the Iris, or any of the Lou Pépé bottlings, let us know how they tasted.

Related Tempest Articles

For more on the differences between lambic, gueuze, and kriek, and for tips on where you can find all the Belgian beer you’d ever want to drink, see my Where the Wild Beers Are: Brussels and Flemish Brabant.

A Twist of Sour: New Belgium’s 2013 La Folie and Verhaeghe’s Duchesse de Bourgogne

Three Vintages of Goose Island’s Sofie

A Rodenbach Grand Cru in the Fridge, or a Six-Pack of Lesser Beer in the Fridge?

Sources

On the technical and aesthetic aspects of lambic brewing, including turbid mashes, hop aging, and characteristic ester and phenolic profiles of various yeast and bacteria strains, see Jeff Sparrow, Wild Brews: Beer Beyond the Influence of Brewers’ Yeast (Boulder, CO: Brewers Publications, 2005).

“Brewery Cantillon: Traditional Family-Run Brewery,” (Brussels, n.d.).

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All images by F.D. Hofer

© 2016 F.D. Hofer and A Tempest in a Tankard. All rights reserved.

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13 thoughts on “Of Coolships, Cobwebs, and Cantillon”

  • Great post (all your posts are excellent)! I’ve often heard of Cantillon being legendary. Unfortunately, living in NJ, I’ve never had the good fortune to see it locally, much less imbibe it. But I do love Belgian sours, Flemish Red Ales, gueuzes, lambics, wild ales, etc. A friend and I are hoping, if it all works out, to do a little beercation next summer. We hope to spend a few days in Belgium (Brussels, Bruges, a Trappist monastery or two) and some time in Germany (Munich, Bamberg, etc.) and the Czech Republic. Your article has whetted my appetite (not that it really needed whetting).

    • Irving,

      As always, I appreciate the kind words very much! It makes the effort of writing all the more worthwhile.

      I’m a huge fan of all the Belgian beer styles you list. Rodenbach Grand Cru is one of my favourite “go to” beers if I’m looking for something a little special). I had always read and heard so much about Cantillon, but I, too, had never seen it anywhere. So I solved that little conundrum by going to Brussels. Sounds like you and your friend are getting set to do the same thing. Have you ever been to Bruges? Wonderful place. It’s where I had my first (rather unfortunate) experience with Belgian beer. I was young. The beer kinda looked like the Pils I was quaffing during my year as an exchange student in Saarbrücken. But it was a Tripel. And I had knocked back more than a few before I realized just what that meant. …

      Bamberg: Aecht Schlenkerla’s classic, but be sure to stop off at Spezial as well. A really exquisite take on Rauchbier. Mahrs Bräu is a must when you need a break from all the Rauchbier. Their ungespundetes Bier is superb. (“Ungespundetes Bier” is in the same family as Zwickl and Kellerbier. It’s unfiltered and of very low carbonation.)

      When you’re in the Munich area, save some time for the (literal) trek to Kloster Andechs. You can start from Frieding and walk through meadows along the ancient pilgrimage route, or start from Herrsching at the end of the S8 S-Bahn line and climb up through the woods.

      If you go to Plzen while in the Czech Republic, the labyrinth of caves beneath the Pilsener Urquell brewery is worth the price of admission alone.

      Happy planning! Once you’re back, let me know how it all went! And if you want any more ideas in the meantime, don’t hesitate to drop me a line.

      • Franz,

        Thanks so much for all the great information. I am bookmarking this page! I will let you know how it all went. But we won’t take the trip till next summer. I’m really looking forward to it, Bruges and all. I’ve never been to Bruges but have been told and seen pictures of how beautiful it is. And I am really looking forward to having my favorite lager in the world again: Augustiner Brau Helles.

        Irving

        • Irving,

          I’m looking forward to hearing all about it next summer! In the meantime, I’ll raise an Augustiner to you next time I’m in Munich — hopefully during Oktoberfest this year, if I haven’t missed the boat on finding accommodations.

          • Thanks, Franz. I hope you are successful at finding accommodations for Oktoberfest. The latter must be such a blast! (On the Bucket List for one day!) Prost! Enjoy the Augustiner.

      • So interesting to revisit this page/article almost three years to the day after it first appeared. I actually got to go to Bruges and Brussels last year (Summer 2018). What can you say about both those places? Bruges with its beauty and charm as well as great food and great beer. And Brussels with Cantillon, where a friend and I also did the self-guided tour. Remarkable masterpiece of a beer/brewery! (I must say that Mannequin Pis is definitely overrated as a tourist landmark!). And I got to Munich twice last year, one of those times during Oktoberfest. To my sad discovery, the ‘Munich 6’ pretty much only sell the Marzen variety of their lagers during Oktoberfest. I found that I don’t like the Marzen version as much. Too malty sweet for me. In addition, I made a wonderful discovery in Prague of one of my new favorite lagers in the world: the American-style lager at the Prague Pivovar, U Tri Ruzi. Still love your posts as always, Franz. Prost!

        • I didn’t realize that it had been almost three years! Wow! Since posts about Cantillon have a long shelf life, and since blogs are notoriously difficult to navigate, I thought I’d put the article out there again.

          So nice to hear that you made it to Bruges and Brussels last summer! I’m fortunate in that I have a friend who works as a translator for the EU in Brussels, so I get to visit fairly often. Every time, I do as you did: head to Cantillon. It never gets old. Last month I had an elderberry gueuze. As for Mannequin Pis? I just have a quick glance at what he’s wearing on that particular day and then head to one of my personal faves, Poechenellekelder, which is just across the alley. Bruges never gets old as well.

          Two times in one year in Munich? That’s great! Though I quite like the Festbier that the Big 6 sell in their tents during Oktoberfest, I do think it’d be nice if they offered a choice between their golden-hued Festbier and the amber Märzens they used to sell. And maybe a Hefeweizen thrown in as well. But with that kind of astounding volume, I can sort of understand why the tents limit things to one kind of beer. Beer-wise, my favourite time to visit is during “Starkbierzeit” because I love Doppelbocks. The weather can be hit-or-miss, though. Beyond that, any time a beer garden is open is my favourite time to visit.

          Keep me posted on your travels, Irving! Always nice to hear where you’ve been.
          Prost!

          • Thanks so much, Franz. Your replies are so appreciated. All the best to you in your travels!

  • Yeah, if you don’t know what Cantillon is, you have to be living under a rock. Everyone I know knows about this drink by now, and they want to have a taste of this. I’ll have this drink at my next house-party.

    • True, many beer enthusiasts know about Cantillon, but not all. And folks just getting into beer won’t know about Cantillon. If they’re in North America, chances are they’ll learn about a whole pantheon of American (and some Canadian) craft beers before they hear about beers like Cantillon, Westy XII, or even more widely available beers like Sam Smith or the German classics.

      Nice to hear you’ll have Cantillon at your next house party! Wish I could be there.

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